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Tennis, Anyone? … Anyone in America?

The 2010 U.S. Open kicks off today in Flushing, N.Y., with a wide-open field that offers more than enough quirks and storylines to last us into mid-September. Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, on opposite ends of the draw, are set up to meet in the Open final for the first time in their storied, shared histories. Danish 20 year-old Caroline Wozniacki — fresh off a win in New Haven’s Pilot Pen Classic — enters as the number one seed despite never having won a major. But the pervading theme tying both genders together in the season’s final major is a simple one: United States tennis is not, according to those covering the sport, in very good shape right now.

Getty Images

Sure, the U.S. has Venus Williams and Andy Roddick, but it’s no Belgium these days.

Both draws feature an American in the top 10: Andy Roddick (who turns 28 Monday) and Venus Williams (who just turned 30). After those two, the American challengers are few and far between.

“There is no American under 28 years old who owns even a remote shot at an Open singles title,” Filip Bondy of the Daily News writes, pointing out that after Roddick at number nine, a trio of Americans — John Isner, Mardy Fish, and Sam Quarrey Querrey — are ranked 20th through 22nd. The next American is all the way down at 70. Roddick, however, contends that things aren’t as bad as Bondy makes them seem. “All the numbers that are being reported as far as apparel sales, participation, TV ratings, this, that, and the other, are up,” Roddick tells Bondy. “So I have a hard time dealing with the question that says, ‘What’s wrong?’”

Diane Pucin of the Los Angeles Times paints a similarly bleak picture for the American women. Williams is the only seeded American in the top 32. “The main draw includes 12 American women, but only four—Venus, Bethanie Mattek-Sands, Vania King and Jill Craybas—got in without either qualifying or receiving a wild card.”

“The days of American domination might be over for good,” Michelle Kaufman of the Miami Herald writes. “The game is much more global now, and the knock on many American junior players is that they come from homes with money and aren’t as hungry or willing to work as many of the juniors overseas.”

One way to strengthen the U.S. crop of players, according to Greg Couch of Fanhouse, is to essentially steal them away from other countries. Couch has an engrossing read on the development of lefty clay court specialist Andrea Collarini, an 18-year-old dubbed the Chosen One, who was born in the U.S., moved to Argentina when he was three, and is now back playing for the Americans. “This is a messy story, as accusations fly between the Argentines and the U.S.,” Couch writes. “The law of capitalism is winning out here. The U.S. is simply big enough to squash the Argentine federation, to gobble up its best player and make him ours.” The USTA, according to Couch, claims that Collarini said he wanted to come back to the United States. Collarini, however, tells Couch that he was approached first by the USTA. The Argentineans, understandably, see this as the USTA stealing a player they developed, and Couch notes that the Argentine federation wrote to the USTA asking for compensation for taking their best youth prospect.

Collette Lewis of the New York Times has another oddball American tale: that of Irina Falconi, the 385th-ranked player who made the Open as a qualifier. Falconi learned the game on New York’s public courts, playing in Washington Heights at Inwood Park. “It still hasn’t quite hit me yet,” Falconi told Lewis, when asked about playing in front of hometown fans.

* * *

News broke Friday that Washington Nationals phenom pitcher Stephen Strasburg had a torn ligament in his elbow and would need Tommy John surgery, meaning the majors would likely be without the 2009 top pick for about a year. To say the news was crushing to Nationals fans — and, it might be fair to say, baseball fans across North America — would be an understatement. “Strasburg brought the rare good news amid other Washington sports stories that led SportsCenter,” the Washington Post’s Mike Wise writes. “‘Haynesworth a No-Show’ and ‘Arenas Sentenced on Gun Charge’ were suddenly superseded by this mythical fireballer from San Diego.”

The reports brought with them a share of misinformed analysis. Injury expert Will Carroll of Baseball Prospectus was probably the most frustrated man in baseball on Friday, having to deal with people comparing Strasburg to Mark Prior. “Next time someone makes a Prior-Strasburg comparison,” Carroll tweeted, “remind them that Prior’s elbow is fine. His shoulder? Not so much.”

* * *

The United States men’s basketball team improved to 2-0 in the FIBA championships in Istanbul Sunday, defeating Slovakia, 99-77, behind 22 points from Kevin Durant. This summer’s entry in the world championships is more of a Dream Team Lite, having a roster of younger, lesser-known players on the roster after invitations went ignored by some of the NBA’s bigger names (players cited everything from free agency to wanting rest). This summer’s team, a likable group of hard-working players, have been tasked with bringing home America’s first world championship title since 1994 and in the process locking up an automatic bid to the 2012 Olympics. At the same time, they’re also winning over fans who are enjoying the ego-free end to a summer that featured LeBron James’s Decision.

“To watch Kevin Durant, Derrick Rose, Stephen Curry and the rest,” the Columbus Dispatch’s Michael Arace writes, “is to believe that there is a bright future beyond the one-named wonders.”

* * *

The Waipio (Hawaii) Little League All-Stars fell one game short of capturing the United States’s sixth-straight Little League World Series title Sunday, falling 4-1 to Japan. Their major league brethren took notice. In Seattle, pitcher Brandon Legaue, a native of Hawaii, made a gentleman’s bet with Japan’s Ichiro Suzuki on the outcome of the game. Meanwhile, Ichiro’s translator Anthony Suzuki didn’t know whom to root for; according to MLB.com’s Doug Miller, Anthony Suzuki went to high school in Hawaii, but college in Japan. “It’s a tough one,” he told Miller, “but I’ll go with Hawaii.”

In Philadelphia, Hawaiian Shane Victorino exchanged texts with Hawaii’s coach and had a Phillies employee put one of the team’s games on the stadium’s big screen last week during batting practice. “I’m proud of the kids,” Victorino told The Inquirer’s Matt Gelb after the loss. “They never gave up.”

Comments (5 of 12)

Wow!! I like reading about tennis because since I am 6 years old I wan't to play this!

9:52 am September 1, 2010

Mimi wrote:

I see several reasons for the paucity of tennis stars from the USA. Until just recently, the US lagged foreign countries in the way we taught juniors how to play tennis. Unlike any other sport, very young children were given the exact same equipment and size court as Rodger Federer uses in the US Open. Finally, the USTA has endorsed starting children on small courts with small nets, balls, and rackets. The students can learn the correct form and use effective strokes from the beginning. They will also enjoy longer rallies and have more success sooner, and they will progress to a full sized court.

Secondly, I see a major problem with college tennis. The rosters of most division one schools are filled with foreign players who are using colleges and universities as practice for the challenger circuit. As a mother of a junior player, I can attest that it is discouraging knowing that only the top 50 or so in the nation will get to play division one tennis. College should be the proving ground for our kids; the NCAA should define a limit of foreign players to two per team. Regardless of the number of professional tennis players colleges produce, I think that our tax dollars should go to US citizens. But, that is an argument for another day.

5:25 pm August 31, 2010

10is wrote:

Yea, I have an ax to grind with a racist organization.

6:10 pm August 30, 2010

Anonymous wrote:

10is, you obviously have an ax to grind. Why don't you just come out with it and give us some details, instead of things like "good luck if you’re white boy"?

5:14 pm August 30, 2010

10is wrote:

I agree with Tennis is Great that tennis is great exercise but unfortunately the sport has been corrupted by the politically correct USTA. You also wonder about IMG, which controls the rights to put on every slam, I believe. What other sport allows the agent for almost every player to control its tournaments?

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